Brewpubs blossom in city and suburbs, plus a guide to the newest crop

There's a new movement changing the landscape of our neighborhood dining scene. And it's flowing on draft at an independent brewpub near you.

With the craft-beer movement doubling its share of the U.S. market over the last five years, most Americans now live within 10 miles of a brewery. In the beer-savvy Philadelphia region, people are even closer.

Increasingly, those breweries are taking the form of brewpubs, the number of which has quadrupled over the last four years in Pennsylvania. Many of the best are quirky and creative, serving thoughtfully prepared menus that, in the suburbs, offer a handcrafted alternative to the chain food culture, and in the city, capture the diverse character of emerging neighborhoods bristling with youthful energy.

The boomlet is fueled both by an increasingly sophisticated beer public and liberalized regulations allowing new concepts to flourish and become sustainable.

"There's a sticking-it-to-the-man quality to what we're doing," says Mike Wambolt, 27, of Crime & Punishment Brewing, a pocket-size space in fast-rising Brewerytown where hipsters at community tables drink glasses of smokey grodziskie along with Russian dumplings and borscht. "Millennials want unique flavors and to know we're supporting local economies rather than a humongous corporate brewery."

A similar impulse has driven the success of Tired Hands' new Fermentaria in Ardmore, where owner Jean Broillet IV's efforts to shirk convention with funky tacos and barrel-aged saisons in an old trolley works have put this Main Line town (also home to Tired Hands' first "Brew Cafe") on the national beer geek map.

The local corporate chains are doing well, too, as evidenced by the continued expansion of the pioneering Iron Hill group, soon to open its 12th in Huntingdon Valley. And this week Victory Brewing Co., the nation's 29th-largest craft brewer, will open its second huge brewpub this year alone, a bi-level 350-seater attached to its new production facility in rural Parkesburg.

"It's an investment in our community," says Victory cofounder Bill Covaleski, who said they have even put in a hitching post. "About 20 percent of the township's population is Amish and Mennonite."

Whether the beer-and-buggy crowd materializes remains to be seen. But biking for beer is already a thing, as evidenced by the weekend cyclists who peddle the Schuylkill River Trail to the Conshohocken Brewing Co. for the reward of a fresh pint and a tangy pork sandwich.

"People like small and local with beer now as much as with food," says Glen Macnow, the sports talk radio host who invested in the Conshohocken brewery with 20 others. "If I end up losing money, what more fun way to do it?"

And failures have happened. Guild Hall Brewing Co. in Jenkintown closed in October after just four months due to lack of capital and admitted misfires on early batches of beer. In this well-schooled beer market, that can be fatal.

"I always tell people to be prepared to dump out bad beer," says Scott Rudich of Round Guys Brewing in Lansdale. "You can't explain it away."

The brewpub business is famous for its booms and busts, especially in the 1990s when an early corporate wave crashed.

"There were so many failures then because people were getting into the business for the wrong reasons," says Tom Baker of Mount Airy's Earth Bread + Brewery, who in December plans to open a brewpub in Fairmount with partners called Bar Hygge.

"People aren't doing it just for the money nowadays, because I don't taste much bad beer anymore," he says. "I think there are already enough great breweries. But I really believe in the future of brewpubs and their ability to become an important part of neighborhoods."

While brewpub activity has been sparse in New Jersey because projects must acquire both brewery licenses and prohibitively expensive liquor licenses, the trend in Pennsylvania has been startling growth. In 2011, there were 24 licensed brewpubs in the state, according to the Liquor Control Board. Just four years later there are 99, with applications for 10 more pending. Over the same period, Pennsylvania's licensed breweries more than doubled from 102 in 2011 to 233 in 2015.

That ratio of brewpubs to microbreweries here is considerably higher than the national average, says Bart Watson, chief economist for the Brewers Association. He sees it as a sign of strength.

"Where there is a more advanced craft brewing scene, you're going to see more brewpubs," he said. "It's a great way to differentiate yourself as a scene gets more crowded."

It has also become a more profitable model for small breweries that may have a tough time reaching wide distribution.

"When I sell a keg wholesale, I make $100 to $125," says Rudich. "In the pub, that keg earns between $500 and $600."

Likewise, the five-year-old Boxcar Brewing Co. now sells 90 percent of its production at the brewpub it opened in February in downtown West Chester.

In the suburbs, where Rudich says customers are "one step away from an Applebee's and want a full restaurant experience," a $2,325 brewpub license and a small brewing system is a cost-effect alternative to going BYOB. "Secondhand liquor licenses now go for over $300,000 in Montgomery County. But for $25,000, you can get a license and a small brewery."

A couple of significant clarifications in PLCB policy this summer, however, have begun to blur the technical lines between brewpub and brewery licenses, opening up the field to all kinds of hybrid possibilities.

On May 31, the PLCB finally allowed holders of a production brewery "G" license to sell their beers retail on site - provided they have tasting rooms with at least 10 seats and food as minimal as a bag of pretzels. Some breweries, like the new 2SP in Aston and Free Will in Perkasie, have done just that, bringing in food trucks to supplement their minimalist menus.

Other "G" license holders, like Crime & Punishment, have embraced more ambitious food programs, handcrafting dumplings and soups on site.

One additional new clarification from the PLCB has also drawn interest: Breweries are now also allowed to open two satellite tasting rooms (technically "storage facilities") for off-site retail sales, not unlike what's permitted for wineries and distilleries.

This is especially intriguing to established suburban players like Forest & Main, which is already using one of its satellites for an expanded tasting room in a building behind its Ambler brewpub. Could a city branch be far away?

"We're going to be see a lot of breweries opening satellites," said co-owner Gerard Olson. "Who wouldn't be psyched for a Fishtown IPA Lab from Tired Hands or a Passyunk Barrel House from Forest & Main?"

There are no formal plans yet, he says. But with the region's brewpub landscape tilting in favor of more growth, Olsen concedes, "I really love the idea."

claban@phillynews.com

215-854-2682@CraigLaBan

www.philly.com/craiglaban

StartText

The amber wave of brewpubs offers an array of options. Live Life Love, H17.EndText